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This study aimed to develop a scale to determine teacher candidates' perceptions of the European Union (EU). A descriptive survey method was used in the study, and the study group consisted of 908 teacher candidates attending the Kirsehir Ahi Evran University Faculty of Education in the fall semester of 2021-2022 academic year. The participants were selected using a convenient sampling technique. The Perception Scale of the European Union comprised 20 items and three factors: anxiety, contribution, and culture was employed as the main research tool. The Cronbach's Alpha internal consistency coefficient was calculated for the said scale as 0.746, which indicated scale reliability. Data were analyzed using percentage, frequency, mean, and standard deviation techniques. Additionally, t-test and ANOVA were performed to identify the differences between samples. The study results showed that the teacher candidates' anxiety levels for the European Union were high, and their perceptions of the "contribution" and "culture" factors were moderate. The analysis of perceptions of the EU and political literacy skills of the participants revealed a significant difference in the "contribution" factor but no significant difference in the "anxiety" and "culture" factors. According to the relationship between teachers' perceptions of the EU and their cultural literacy skills, there was a significant difference in the "culture" factor but no significant difference appeared in the "anxiety" and "contribution" factors.

The official policy documents of the Greek preschool education adopt a functional perspective of writing (i.e., writing for real communicative purposes) which signals an attempt to align the national language policy with the communicative language policy of the European Union. In this article, the consistency of this alignment is examined by focusing on the compatibility between this functional perspective and the writing goals of the official instructional designs of the Greek preschool education. Using a document-based investigation, 76 instructional designs were collected and analysed through a deductive and a descriptive statistical process of content analysis by calculating frequencies between the writing goals of each design with goals which reflect either the functional-pragmatic view of writing (writing as purposeful communication) or the opposite structural one (emphasis on the autonomous layers of language; phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics). It was found that the structural writing goals, appearing in most instructional designs, diverge from the official functional view of writing focusing on the structural phonological goal of how children can learn to correspond sounds with letters (a main feature of the traditional language instruction). This divergence signals a divergence from the European language policy which simultaneously gives emphasis on key communicative competences and the functional communicative language instruction. Therefore, a prerequisite of the instructional designs for fulfilling the European communicative goals is an epistemological shift from language structure to language function.

International student mobility has been rising as a global phenomenon in the last few decades, while its impact could be various in different contexts. For the European Union (EU), studying in another EU member country could be regarded as an important factor for the solidarity and integrity of the Union. The current study elaborates on the role of studying abroad regarding the attitudes of people toward immigration in the EU. It shows that people who are studying in an EU member country, belonging to higher social classes and from EU15 countries, are more likely to have positive attitudes toward immigration. But after controlling several socio-demographic variables studying abroad still contributes positively to the attitudes of EU citizens toward immigration. Accordingly, current study provides promising pieces of evidence on the social contribution of studying abroad for both future research and policymakers.

This study aims to reveal the economic and political issues underlying the remarks related to initial teacher education (ITE) in the documents published by international institutions, European Union (EU), Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), and United Nations (UN), and to examine these issues from the perspective of consensus and conflict approaches to education. The study is designed as a systematic review. ITE-related 67 documents published by UN, EU, and OECD were analyzed following several coding steps. According to the results, international institutions promote entrepreneurship, life-long learning, and information and communication technologies as economic issues in ITE. As political issues, they put forward social themes including preparing for diversity, quality in ITE including accountability and standards, and structure of ITE including flexibility and autonomy. Although the documents are mainly parallel with the consensus approach, economic and political issues revealed in the study were discussed from perspectives of both approaches. One perspective considers promoting the economic issues in ITE the economic efficiency and growth which is beneficial for all. The other reminds that division of this benefit may include class-based inequalities. Also, different perspectives emphasize different social themes and they bring different explanations for how the quality assurance functions. [This article includes an extended summary in Turkish.]

Asylum seekers are generally excluded from welfare provisions, social support, and higher education (HE) in their host countries. The depth and impact of these exclusions is barely known, as this population remains invisible and underserved. This article aims to deepen understanding of the challenges asylum seekers face in accessing HE in Western countries and present potential solutions. Existing literature highlights (1) socioeconomic challenges such as poverty, unrecognition of qualifications, low language proficiency, and mental health issues; (2) institutional barriers; and (3) good practices such as policy advocacy, scholarships, alternative admission paths, staff and faculty training, community collaboration, and asylum seeker involvement in policy and decision-making. We pose critical questions on the role of higher education institutions in addressing migration challenges and facilitating integration through access to education. An ongoing student-run initiative at a private U.S. university serves as a case example to offer further directions for research and practice.

Research productivity and research excellence are elements essential to the creation of a conducive research environment, in which research publications, research dissemination, and research utilization, are key in fostering the sustainability of higher education institutions. In this study, the current institutional policies, practices, and initiatives that encourage research productivity were explored. A mixed-method methodology, embodying a sequential exploratory approach, was adopted for the study. Non-probability, convenient sampling was used to select Higher Education Institutions (HEIs). A survey questionnaire comprising closed and open-ended questions was used for data collection. The data collection tool was piloted and refined. An integrative analysis consisting of descriptive statistical analysis and thematic analysis was used to analyze the collected data. The findings of this study highlight the instrumental role of university staff and students for research productivity. Building an institutional research culture was seen to boost research productivity. Increasing research capacity and visibility, the implementation of appropriate management infrastructure and the adoption of research policies were found to be effective strategies to support research productivity within Higher Education settings. Support for research publication and publication performance management was similarly identified to improve research productivity. It is recommended that the policies, practices, and initiatives set by HEIs should focus on research productivity, creating an institutional research culture, supporting research publications, and research performance management, in order to drive research productivity and contribute towards sustainability.

This article discussed the trends and features of the formation of digital competence of future teachers through virtual games such as Kahoot and Quizlet. The purpose of this article was to identify modern features of the use of virtual games in the educational process of future teachers in European Union. To achieved this goal, an analytical study was conducted on the use of Kahoot and Quizlet in education. A logical, historical, and comparative legal method was used to research prospects of formation of digital competence of future scientific and pedagogical workers of higher education institutions through gamification. Using a comparative legal method, a comparative analysis of the level of use of gamification tools. As a result, conclusions were made about a significant increase in the level of use of gamification tools in various types of educational activities of future research and teaching staff. It was determined that there are negative and positive effects of gamification. It is concluded that the use of gamification tools in various types of educational activities requires students to develop additional skills that are necessary in today's world. Active use of Kahoot, Quizlet in education helps to improve students' adaptive and social skills, quickly analyze their achievements and easily convey new information. Moreover, this format contains features before the usual learning format. Therefore, the problem of developing appropriate methods and skills of gamification in education was becoming urgent. As a result, it was determined that the topic of effective use of gamification tools in education is becoming increasingly important.

The article uses a multi-faceted approach to present the major challenges to vocational education and training (VET) that Hungary and Poland have been facing during the transformation of their economic systems in 1989 and integration into the EU in 2004. The evolution of VET is examined according to historical traditions, its declining prestige, the introduction of dual training, governance, and the involvement of social partners. We also look at recent changes in the two countries as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic and discuss the current situation in the light of VET scenarios recently developed by Cedefop.

Since the mid 1990s vocational and education and training systems across Europe have had to respond to a number of external factors which have transformed the demand for skills. This paper examines the way in which VET systems have responded to the external factors and increase their resilience in the face of external shocks of one kind or another. The paper also reveals the way in which VET increasing established itself as a mainstream option for young people over the same period because of its capacity to deliver skills which the labour market demands.

Vocational education and training is more complex than academic education. It is also subject to important differences among countries due to at least two factors: a) the particular fabric of the productive system of the country and b) the involvement of social actors (employers and unions) as well as the labor market relations and the balance between capital and work. Historical and comparative vocational education and training has deployed a series of analytical tools which have contributed to identify different patterns of existing vocational education systems. Some institutions have also worked in order to help vocational education advance in the past decades: among these, the European Center for the Development of Vocational Training (Cedefop) has twice devised future scenarios in Vocational education, at the turn of the 20th century and right before the COVID-19 pandemics. The combination of current VET systems and suggested scenarios indicate that transformations are subject to negotiation among actors within countries (administration, employers, unions, teachers) and across countries; as well as subject to legitimation of decisions before the wider society. The sociology of conventions is a useful approach to analyse processes of negotiation and legitimation behind historical developments in VET systems; we suggest applying it to tackle current VET scenarios.

The current study aims at providing empirical and theoretical support to the important topic of international student mobility (ISM) in Europe. Specifically, it provides empirical analysis of degree-mobile students in 32 countries: the European Union (EU), the European Free Trade Association (EFTA) and the United Kingdom. The study is based on the aggregate data from the European Tertiary Education Register (ETER). The goal is to construct indicator (benchmark) for analyzing degree mobility of students at the country level. The empirical analysis is conducted from the perspective of a receiving country. It effectively helps to establish the context and content of future discussions on how to address the practical problem of measuring and evaluating the dynamics of students flows in Europe.

Surveillance technology is more and more used in educational environments, which results in mass privacy violations of kids and, thus, the processing of huge amount of children's data in the name of safety. Methodology used is doctrinal, since the focus of this research was given in the implementation of the legal doctrine of data protection law in the educational environments. More than that, the cases of Greece and France regarding the use of surveillance technologies in schools are carefully studied in this article. Privacy risks that both children and educators are exposed to are underlined. In these terms, this research paper focuses on the proper implementation of the European data protection framework and the role of Data Protection Authorities as control mechanisms, so that human rights risks from the perspective of privacy and data protection to be revealed, and the purposes of the use of such technologies to be evaluated. This study is limited in the legal examination of the European General Data Protection Regulation, and its implementation in the legal orders of Greece and France, and practice pertaining to the case studies of Greece and France respectively.

Purpose: This paper aims to present the twenty-five-year evolving pathway of the European dimension in education in Croatia. Furthermore, the paper critically problematises the lack of a theoretical framework that has marked this concept's research and partly contributed to its conceptual dispersion and scholarly ambiguity. Design: The paper design is based on chronological and content analysis of the European dimension in education development, primarily focusing on the Croatian context. The period analysed is from 1996, when the first paper on the European dimension in education in Croatia was published until 2020. Findings: The development frame of the European dimension in education is proposed, with an overview of appurtenant phases, followed by chronological and detailed elaborated thematic groups. As an answer to detected theoretical deficiencies, the political praxiology of education is introduced as a direction of its future theoretical development and a partly new shift in the conceptual definition of the European dimension in education is proposed.

The European Higher Education Area (EHEA) is an international initiative for the harmonisation of higher education (HE) systems in 49 countries. Literature about UK's participation in the EHEA is limited, and the role of EHEA's membership for the UK, particularly after the end of the Brexit transitional period, has not been researched. The originality of the study reported in this paper is in addressing this gap by exploring the perspectives of key UK HE actors on the strategic significance of UK's memberships in the EHEA post-2020 for the UK. The paper draws on the theoretical ideas of rational choice neo-institutionalism, differentiated Europeanisation and internationalisation, and a thematic analysis of 19 official communications of key stakeholders and six in-depth interviews with their representatives. The findings contribute to filling in a significant gap in the literature about Bologna in the UK in making a distinction between its two memberships in the EHEA and the differences and complexities of the roles they play in constructing UK's overarching agenda in HE particularly in the post-Brexit context. The article has also contributed to the literature about Bologna more widely, presenting an investigation into differentiated Europeanisation that has been taking place within one unique post-EU country.

The role of education in the development of pro-EU attitudes is often examined by focusing on the association of educational attainment and the development of pro-EU attitudes. However, student exchanges and youth mobility have also become pillars of the foundation of the European Higher Education Area, figuring out the Maastricht Treaty and the Bologna Declaration. Accordingly, based on a utilitarian approach, the current study investigates the role of participation in learning abroad mobility in the development of positive views on the EU. In doing so, Flash Eurobarometer 478 data was used and multinomial logistic regression analyses were performed by student and non-students groups of youth in the new (NMS) and old (EU15) member states. The findings show that the role of participation depends on the degree of positive views, and it makes a significant contribution to having Very Positive views on the EU among non-students in both national groups and students in the NMS. Findings also demonstrate that participation is more important than consideration in the development of Very Positive views. So, even if respondents could have already been supportive of the EU before participation, participation also takes their positive views on the EU to a higher level.

This article examines enrolment trends in UK transnational higher education since the early 2000s. During the first phase, which lasted until the mid-2010s, TNE enrolments grew rapidly but thereafter, during the second phase, levelled off very significantly. A third phase of high enrolment growth coincides with the departure of the UK from the European Union and the start of the COVID pandemic. The article focuses on medium-longer-term supply and demand factors which, collectively, are resulting in a marked slowdown in TNE enrolments at British universities.

Purpose: Private supplementary tutoring, widely known as shadow education, has long been visible in East Asia, and now has spread to other parts of the world including Europe. This article maps the phenomenon, showing variations within Europe and analyzing its growth, underlying forces, and policy implications. Design/Approach/Methods: The article assembles a regional picture from available national sources. It focuses on the 28 members of the European Union. Findings: Within Europe, four subregions may be identified. Most prominent for the longest duration has been Southern Europe, pushed by political forces and cultural factors. In Eastern Europe, shadow education became prominent following the collapse of the Soviet Union and accompanying economic and social structures during which teachers and others had to earn extra incomes. In Western Europe, the advent of marketization alongside government schooling has fueled the growth of shadow education. Only in Northern Europe does shadow education remain modest in scale, but it is growing there too. Originality/Value: The article identifies forces underlying the growth of shadow education in Europe and highlights policy implications. By contributing this regional perspective to the wider literature on shadow education, the article permits juxtaposition with patterns in East Asia and elsewhere.

This contribution explores the legal scope of a concept that is indispensable to the existence of academia; the principle of academic freedom. More particular, this research addresses this concept within the European Union. Particular attention is paid to the recent milestone judgment of the CJEU in the case of European Commission v. Hungary. In this ruling, for the first time in its history the Court adjudicated on academic freedom. Both the scope the Court assigns to academic freedom and the innovative nature of its approach are examined. It is ascertained whether the Court has caused a change of direction. At the same time, an assessment of the possible impact of the ruling on the future of higher education in the European Union is provided. Bearing in mind the universal nature of the concept, a number of findings are also applicable beyond its borders.

The purpose of this study is to trace and document the emerging contours of a Vocational Training, Adult Education and Lifelong Learning (VTAELL) space in the EU via an examination of the policy framework built over time in this area over more than six decades, from the inception of today's European Union to the present day. Nineteen key primary sources were selected from the EU's legislative record forming the growing overarching legal framework on VTAELL from 1951 to present. These were subjected to a discourse and content analysis, utilizing a process tracing approach to systematically record the gradual construction of VTAELL policy. The narrative shows that policy evolution in this field can be grouped into three distinct stages: "policy groundwork"; "programmatic operationalization"; "consolidation", "integration and expansion." Furthermore, the analysis reveals that the convergence and cross-referencing of EU's VTAELL policy across education sectors validates the importance and consolidation of this policy space.

Guaranteed Minimum Income (GMI) is currently the principal mechanism for fighting poverty and achieving social inclusion among a plethora of social policies in the European Union (EU). In GMI, education and vocational training hold a major role in fighting social exclusion and promoting social cohesion. The first part of the paper discusses the characteristics and limitations of the GMI scheme. The second part of the paper discusses an alternative model for income support, intended to achieve a fairer and more cohesive society, the Universal Basic Income (UBI). We close by highlighting the potential of UBI schemes on reconfiguring that UBI schemes have on reconfiguring education, with an emphasis on adult education. On its own, UBI cannot challenge the neoliberal hegemony. However, UBI can become a means for shifting attention to alternative conceptualisations of social inclusion based on the creation of adult education for critical and participatory citizenship.

This paper investigates the impacts of recent, macro-level developments in transatlantic relations on the ability of United States and European Union higher education institutions (HEIs) to leverage international partnerships in achieving their traditional missions of teaching, research, and service. Using literature to place international education within the broader context of transatlantic relations from the post-World War II era to today, the connection between geopolitics and HEI international partnerships is made explicit. Comprehensive internationalization theory is then applied to illustrate the importance of HEI international partnerships in realizing international education outcomes that are congruent with traditional HEI missions. After establishing the link between transatlantic relations, internationalization in higher education, HEI international partnerships and overall HEI performance, recent developments within transatlantic relations are directly analyzed with regards to HEI international partnerships, highlighting impacts on their ability to function. Finding that progressive transatlantic relations result in improved performance outcomes through HEI international partnerships for US and EU HEIs, and that regressive transatlantic relations produce the opposite outcome, the study offers implications for policy makers and HEI administrators.

This article examines the relationship between European language policy and funded language learning projects in the field of LSP. We look at why and how the objectives were expressed, how the overall directions have evolved over the past decade, and how the LSP landscape has been redefined through research and implementation. Our discursive and ethnographic analysis is based on the framework texts published by Europe in the "Lifelong Learning Programme" and then in the "Erasmus+ Programme." These institutional texts are put into perspective with the documents produced in the framework of three European projects in which we have participated: LILAMA (employability), INCLUDE (social inclusion), TRAILs (teacher training). Our analysis seeks to identify and explain the reasons that led to the shift from working on the needs of companies and employees to focusing on the needs necessary for implementation, which implies that interest is now focused on the training needs of the teachers involved in this context (Basturkmen, 2019) and on the challenges that remain to be met.

Following the severe impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on education systems in Europe, the EU has been called upon to provide a concerted response to the crisis in a context where member states provided their own diverse responses. Against this background, the aim of this article is to uncover and critically examine the EU's education policy discourse and promoted narratives since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, and by doing so evaluate the EU's response-ability for education recovery during the crisis. A conceptual framework has been devised to analyse the responsiveness of an international entity, such as the EU, based on organisational and neo-institutionalist theories. Data were collected through a combination of discourse analysis and computer-assisted content analysis, which was applied to official EU education policy documents published in 2020. The following categories emerged from the analysis process, indicating that the EU perceives education recovery as: "upskilling and reskilling", "digital transformation" and "sustainable development". The findings suggest a substantial continuation between the EU's pre- and post-COVID-19 strategy in the education sector, and even an acceleration in the same direction, revealing a lack of real change in the EU's response, which was focused predominantly on the economic and employability approach to education.

The aim of establishing the European Higher Education Area (EHEA) marked the development of the Bologna process since its beginning, while it exercised a decisive influence on the content of the higher education policy initiatives undertaken over the years. One of the most important goals of the relevant policy making was to bridge the university-to-labour market gap and to improve the employability of graduates. Such aims require a consistent and multidimensional cooperation between higher education institutions and the social partners, mainly employers, from which significant benefits may derive for all parties involved. As a result, many types of work based learning have been promoted in higher education with the most prominent of them being the student work experience programmes organised by universities in collaboration with enterprises. The paper analyses the guidelines provided by the EHEA framework with regard to the cooperation between universities and the social partners. Also, it discusses the role that has been attributed to (or claimed by) the social partners regarding work experience programmes. The EHEA institutional framework includes provisions for the participation of social partners in the organisation of work placements, which contribute to students' skills development and easier transition to employment.

This paper aims at highlighting and interpreting current empirical facets of the Greek educational pathogeny through a sociological approach. Especially, the paper tries to investigate the relationship between education and employment in modern Greece based on the annual statistical report of KANEP/GSEE, choosing both selected facets and sociologically interpreted issues such as public and private expenditure, trends on specialties, outcomes of initial training teacher's profile etc. According to this data, the main political challenge is based on both the decrease of public expenditure and the maintenance of significantly high levels of household expenditure. Additionally, current trends, such as «brain drain» or migration of highly educated people, prove that Greek public universities' learning outcomes remain competitive and effective through the framework of a global labour market, notwithstanding the harsh critique blaming them for «statism» and mismatching with the labour needs.

Numerous UK universities are experiencing financial instability; with an increasingly competitive and maturing market, reliance has grown on international students to offset institutional shortfalls. Dependency on international student tuition revenue has over-exposed the market to dramatic shifts in political policies, both domestic and internationally, that could significantly impact operational success. UK higher education institutions (HEIs) ability to promote their institutions as they are intertwined with the UK government; thus, controversial policies create a backlash, drawing HEIs into disputes as unwanted participants yet recipients of significant economic disruption. Government policies on domestic tuition caps, Brexit, and increasing geopolitical disputes with China have had a considerable impact on institutional operations. This paper recommends HEIs, principally lower-tabled universities, take a more aggressive strategic realignment to best adapt to the marketplace's uncertainty. By reemphasising institutional specialisation, variable tuition rates for under-represented growth markets, financial support for EU students, increased distance education presence, and intense market-wide lobbying of government MPs, this paper seeks to open a discussion on how to identify existing problems and target opportunities for growth. The complexity of market conditions and the decreasing solvency of many institutions will not be solved by a single recommendation or a short-term policy but by a complete realignment and robust industry-wide initiatives. If universities cease operations or collapse under market conditions' financial strain, it will impact the overall market's reputation, reducing UK institutions' overall desirability as a major exporter of education.

In recent decades, learning abroad mobility has become a popular movement and has often been considered among students in higher education. However, in the European Union (EU) context, opportunities to learn abroad are also provided for non-student groups of youth. Accordingly, this study aims to examine the role of certain socioeconomic factors concerning participation in learning abroad mobility and to compare their contribution between students and non-student groups of youth in six country groups in the EU. In so doing, a quantitative method was followed by using the data of Flash Eurobarometer 478. Findings of the multinomial logistic regression analyses show that although there is no significant difference between the EU15 and NMS (new member states) regarding young people's participation in learning abroad mobility, such difference occurs within the NMS. Students are more likely than nonstudents to participate in general. The age of students, being female and living in rural areas among non-students can also hinder participation.

The reasons for education reforms -- as a particular form of social reforms -- are either consequentialist or non-consequentialist. However, the reasons for the education reforms that are briefly discussed from the perspective of the philosophy of education in the present paper are above all consequentialist. These are the reasons for proposed education reforms in EU countries whose strategic aim is equated with the enhancement of two values: creativity and innovation. It is supposed that these education reforms will have good effects and not that they are good in and of themselves. Therefore, although creativity and innovation might be seen as having intrinsic value, they are -- in these education reforms -- treated predominantly as instrumental values. It seems that the introduction of such education reforms can be understood as a decision founded not on causal explanation, but rather on the basis of a special type of teleological explanation, which has the logical form of a "practical syllogism". In this case, the occurrence of an action is explained in terms of the goals and purposes of the agent; it shows that the agent did what s/he did because s/he tried to achieve a certain goal and believed that certain means were necessary or sufficient for achieving this goal.

"Social Europe Days" is a collaborative four-day international seminar held yearly near Brussels, Belgium, by a network of ten European universities from eight different countries. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the seminar had to be offered virtually and redesigned. The final design included synchronous and asynchronous activities, informal and formal interactions, and a focus on empathy for the existential problems faced by participating students and faculty during the pandemic. This article describes the design challenges, the design choices and decisions that led to the virtual seminar design, and reflections based on lead faculty notes, member checking, and student evaluations.